Saturday, July 7, 2012

Ant Repellent, tried and true

Wednesday morning I came downstairs bleary eyed to make coffee and start on the preparations for the day the last thing I expected to see was the army of ants who had invaded my counter tops during the night. I went to war, spraying and squishing until each and everyone was dead and I was able to claim victory for a short period of time, and then the next army came along, walking up to the bait traps but smart enough not to go in and take sips of the poison residing inside and then I remembered a friend had shared a recipe for an ant repellent on Facebook so I looked her up and found it. I was dubious at first but asked Marc to please go out and purchase the one ingredient that I didn't have on hand.. Boric Acid.

Later that night whilst cleaning up from a day of festivities I looked over and sure enough hundreds of ants were covering my counter tops again and this time I went to war with a new ammunition and oh boy it was like a miracle. It didn't work as my friend had described, they didn't climb up the jar reaching in to take sips and then taking back to the colony, instead I watched in awe as they retraced their footsteps all the way back to the crack in the window ledge from where they first came, so I have to believe the mixture gives off some pretty toxic fumes that only an ant can smell.
So without further ado here is the recipe for you, so you can go to war as soon as you see the first army march on into your home.

1 cup sugar

1 cup Boric acid

3 cups warm water

Cotton balls

2 x 1 pint Mason jars

Mix the sugar and Boric acid together, add water and whisk.

Fill both jars with cotton balls

Pour mix in jars until cotton balls are almost covered

Set where major ant traffic is.

Warn all children and unsuspecting adults what is in the jars so they don't touch the foam that sits on top or even choose to drink it .

2 comments:

For a simpler version, just put some borax out loose (assuming you don't have people who lick your countertops?) - it's actually relatively non-toxic (you shouldn't actively eat it, but it's even used in food in some places without mass mortality or anything), doesn't give off fumes (it's what we use at work, in a very gas-sensitive area), and basically functions the same way as salt to slugs (or general ant poison) - the ants think it's tasty food (guess that's where sugar may make it work faster) and take it home, then dry up like the slugs. Your excess you can toss in with the laundry (or, like our book conservator at work, use it as an anti-acidic and anti-fungal agent in rare books that would be damaged by stronger chemicals). Borax, the wonder-product!